Category: Home Business

Paying Taxes when Forex Trading

Paying Taxes when Forex Trading

It might have taken you months or years to make your first profits trading the foreign exchange markets or FOREX. Hopefully you have records of all your loses as you will need them to now offset the profits you have made trading. That is it, Uncle Sam and the IRS will tax your FOREX winnings as soon as you begin to profit. FOREX traders in the United States have two options to claim their profits from foreign exchange trading, either using IRC Section 1256 dealing with contracts or IRC Section 988 for foreign currency transactions.

With the first IRC section code, 1256, you can file your profits on form 6781 and split them 60/40. 60% of the profits will be taxed as capital gains which is a nice 15% at this time and the other 40% are taxed as ordinary income. The ordinary income tax rate depends on your income level and tax situation. With code section 988 your earnings are taxed as interest income which is the same as ordinary income for the most part. Keep a record that you want to opt-out of section 988 before you start trading to avoid this difficult tax classification.

At the end of the tax year you should receive a 1099 from your FOREX broker. This form is also filed with the IRS which makes it impossible to avoid paying tax on the profits from your trading account. So keep track of all your loses and all your expenses and look into the rules for running a home-based business if you do all your trading from home. There are many deductions you can take as a home-based business that will help cushion the tax bill. Also try to pay estimated taxes throughout the year if you know you will owe when you file your return next April. You can avoid penalties this way and not have to scramble to find the funds to pay the IRS when it is time to report.

Should You Hire An Outside Bookkeeping Business?

Your business is starting to grow. You’re hiring new employees. You’re considering adding a health plan. You might even move from your cramped storefront to a more luxurious space across town. This growth is good news. But it also comes with a price. Your business is gobbling up your free time like never before. You need relief. It might be time to hire an outside bookkeeping business to provide it.

Your talents lie in finding the right employees for your business, crafting marketing plans that attract attention and securing new clients and customers. Spending too many hours balancing your books, tracking unpaid invoices and crafting expense reports is not a good use of your time. You should always be concentrating on income-producing activities. Bookkeeping work, while critical to the financial health of your business, is definitely not an income-generating activity.

That’s why hiring an outside bookkeeping business is a financially wise move for you and your business. A bookkeeping service will handle your financial matters, tracking invoices, revenues, expenses and wages. It will compile the information you’ll need to file your taxes every way. And it will help you decide on whether it makes financial sense to move to a new location or stay put for another year.

Hiring a bookkeeping service will cost you money. But you’ll have to decide if this expense is covered by the amount of free time outsourcing your bookkeeping needs will leave you. Your time is valuable, remember. If you have more time to work on new advertising campaigns or develop new products or services, your business will grow all that much faster. If you have more time to interview potential new employees, the odds are better that you’ll land workers who are as passionate about your business as you are.

Not all bookkeeping businesses are built equally. Some may be operated by Certified Public Accountants (CPAs) while others may be staffed with high-school dropouts. Before outsourcing your bookkeeping, you’ll definitely want to investigate the quality of the employees. Having CPAs around is one indicator that this company knows what it’s doing.

Business owners never enjoy adding a new expense to their bottom lines. But businesses thrive when their owners make the right investments in them. Hiring an outside bookkeeping service is one of those expenses that more than pays for itself in the future.

Use your Home Office as a Tax Deduction

Use your Home Office as a Tax Deduction in 2009

There are certain requirements but if you work from home and have an office in the home, you can deduct the space along with your other business expenses on your 2008 tax filing. There are types of use needed to be able to take this very helpful business deduction. First, you use the space exclusively and regularly for your business. Or two, you use the space as storage for business inventory on a regular basis.

Deduction Computation and Reporting

The deduction is a percentage of your overall home expenses based on the square footage of the office divided by the total square footage of your home. If you operate your business with a loss than your expenses will be limited. To report the tax deduction complete form 8829 and transfer the deduction to your Schedule C line 30.